White Flags
by WarlordFil
Summary: Alone and broken on occupied Cybertron, Samiel must either accept her own destruction or dare to embrace a new philosophy. Beast Machines. Conclusion of the "Tempest Cycle". In four parts.
1. Chapter 1

White Flags

**Author's Note: **"White Flags" is the final "serious" entry in the Tempest Cycle.

I never did get all the possible bits and pieces filled in, so as a matter of information:

Project Lancer's "phase-shifters" were taken from the "Ritter" character who you can read about in the stories "Darkness Visible" and "all friends and kingdom come." I had intentions of putting this character into the Beast Wars (Ironhorse) but those stories never came to pass outside of RP.

We also worked heavily with a "reincarnation" theme, with the idea that BM Megatron could pull individual sparks out of the AllSpark and put those sparks/souls in new bodies, which is why there's some folks back from the dead. Vehicon Captain Stormrave, in time, began to act on her own initiative and eventually discover she was once Autobot Sky Patrol Commander Stormrave from the earlier Tempest Cycle fics like "In the Blueprints, In the Blood."

I never did finish writing the whole story behind Braddore either. Again, as a matter of overview: during Tempest's Rebellion, after Harrier was apparently killed trying to warn Artemis/Pantera that Tempest was planning a revolt, Tempest tried to distract herself by making the Decepticon Albacore her new second-in-command. Unfortunately, Tempest was never able to feel the affection for Albacore that she felt for Harrier, and Albacore didn't love her (which was the only reason Harrier was able to put up with her for so long). Albacore tried to kill the Autobot medic Zodiac (from "In the Blueprints, In the Blood") but he stabbed him with a prototype sword and it fused their sparks together. Braddore is, therefore, a fusion of both Zodiac and Albacore.

At any rate, I thought it was important to put this story up as it finally provides a sense of closure for Tempest/Samiel. Enjoy.

Credits!

Pantera/Artemis, the Beast Wars Starscream concept, and the Beast Wars Laserbeak and Buzzsaw concept belong to Amy K. Cyrway.

Braddore, Zodiac and Albacore belong to Dylan P. Blacquiere

Samiel/Tempest, Harrier, Lancer, Stormrave and Ironhorse belong to me

All other characters, Beast Machines, Maximals, Predacons, Autobots, Decepticons, Vehicons, and Transformers are property of Hasbro.

TIME SETTING: WHITE FLAGS takes place just after the episode SPARKWAR: STRIKE.

"Like the white flags of surrender  
The war is over, the battle ended  
Like the snowflake in my hand that's melted  
Can't you feel my love..."

--Blue Oyster Cult, "White Flags," from the album "Club Ninja"

**WHITE FLAGS**

**Chapter One of Four**

I am alone.

I stand on the highest rooftop, staring out at a ruined city. Below me, the broken bones of Cybertropolis thrust their shattered spires up into the night. There are precious few lights gleaming amongst the rubble. Most of the city lies in darkness.

It is like this everywhere, all across the planet. I find it hard to believe. Even in the midst of the Three Great Wars, it was hard to devastate an entire Cybertronian city. To devastate all cities...

...that, I have seen only once before. Not on Cybertron. On a small outport planet named Kilair.

I am the queen of ruins.

Slowly, I limp towards the crumbling lip of the roof. My right leg is a mangled mess, supported within a brace that only partially compensates for the massive damage which its organic components have suffered. I grit my teeth and hold my frame as straight as possible.

I will not give in. I will not die.

Down below, the Vehicons are patrolling. They hunt in packs, like beasts. Their intelligence is less than beasts. To fall before these sparkless abomonations would be degrading. I should fight them.

There are too many. I would lose...ah, but numbers is not the reason. I would lose because I am a cripple. I would lose because I am outmoded. It is the strong who will inherit this planet...

...and my days have passed.

Still, I am in no hurry to die tonight, and so I transform to beast mode. My right leg is still crippled, but my left leg is powerful enough to push me a few inches into the air. I spread my feathered wings and glide to the edge, where I perch on the roof's lip and settle in to think.

I am the leader of the Predacons, in a time when the name Predacon is meaningless. There are no others. I am the last.

I believe I was also the last Decepticon leader, or at least, the last Decepticon leader to hold the name while there was still a mighty Decepticon armada. There might have been others, after me, who laid claim to the title. I don't know.

In the end, it always comes down to me.

I regard the Vehicons. I envy them their power, their speed. This miserable technoorganic shell is an insult. I don't want to be crippled. I don't want to be hunted. I don't want to die.

The weak always die. The strong prey on the weak. This is how it has always been, and how it always will be. I know this. I learned it long ago, when Brigand and his pirates devastated Kilair. I was one of three survivors. Chopper and Stormrave are long dead. Once again, I am the last.

But I was young then, young and full of fire. Full of hope and vision, that led me from the depths of despair on the path upwards to glory. I combed the scum pits of the universe, found other young castaways like myself. I picked the best of the best and taught them, molded them into a fearsome fighting team. We honed our skills through piracy, then joined Galvatron's army. We made a name for ourselves, became Artemis Prime's elite Quintesson killers during the Quint Occupation.

And then...when the Quint War was over, and Autobots and Decepticons were settling down together for a life of peace, that's when I saw the ultimate danger. Peace was an illusion. War is the natural state of our kind. We must continue to war, or else grow soft and die before a stronger invader. Time would always bring a stronger invader.

So I rallied half of the Decepticons to my side and started the Decepticon Rebellion. What can I say? The strongest must prevail.

The strongest were the Autobots. It was a bitter truth to process. Or rather, the strongest were the Maximals and the Predacons. They were the real winners, claiming dominance when the battle decimated the Autobots and Decepticons.

When all was said and done, I was left with ashes. Phoenix Corps was no more. Beretta had died in the Rebellion. Deuce turned away from me, accepted a peace treaty with the Autobots. I would have fought to the bitter end. Harrier...

Harrier...

I thought Harrier had died. Torn between his friendship with me and his oath to Artemis Prime, he'd accidentally found himself on the receiving end of a missile I'd launched. We never discussed it afterwards. I hadn't meant to kill him. I never learned if he'd meant to betray me, if that was what had put him at Artemis' side when I fired that rocket at her. In the end I don't think either of us wanted, or dared, to know.

However it came about, he wasn't entirely dead. His spark must have been extracted by the Autobots, later reformatted into a Maximal protoform that was part of Optimus Primal's crew. We met in the Beast Wars. He was not as I remembered him--a half-metallic foxhound rather than a VTOL jet--but I was not as he remembered me either. After my rebellion had failed, I became a wanted war criminal, hunted by both the Autobots and the loyal Decepticons as well as my own Decepticons who disowned me. Harried across the galaxy, I made a desperate gambit to cut a deal with the Tri-Predacus Council.

I became their operative. They made me a Predacon. I gave up the name Tempest and became Samiel of the Predacons. I surrendered the power and speed of my Seeker airframe to become a yellow archaeopteryx and live unmolested by the Autobot, Decepticon and Maximal enforcers who still hunted for me. The small jobs rankled me. I was fit for rank, fit for power...but I dared not claim it, lest I attract the attention of my pursuers.

Then the Tri-Predacus council sent me to the Beast Wars, to search for Ravage, Tarantulas, and Pantera, who had not reported back to them. I had not expected to find a full-scale combat taking place on a primitive world, a world millions of years before the emergence of Maximals and Predacons...a world where my rebellion was unknown, a world which I could make the home base of a new pack of raiders. All I had to do was overthrow the current incompetent Predacon leader, claim the allegiance of his troops, and eliminate the pesky Maximals. It was a bonus that my prime target, the renegade Megatron, was the one I had been sent there to eliminate. And once my task for the Tri-Predacus council was complete, I would be a free agent again, and able to do as I wished.

And so, my battle in the Beast Wars began.

***

My homecoming was not what I had expected.

I'd been relaxing at my base, munching on small rodents, when the call came in. At the time, the Beast Wars were coming to their conclusion. Megatron had found the location of the Ark and attempted to destroy it. Those miserable Maximals proved to be better fighters than I anticipated. They actually stopped him. Last I'd heard, Tarantulas was dead and Megatron's base had been destroyed. The Maximals were all posed to clean him up and take him out. After that was done...well...I could take my crew and clean up THEM.

The call changed all that.

"Agent Samiel...this is the Tri-Predacus Council...Mayday! Mayday!"

I bolted upright, dropping a half-eaten mouse and transforming to robot mode. "This is Agent Samiel." The interference was heavy; I could barely make out any picture at all. I adjusted the dials but couldn't bring the image in any clearer.

"Agent Samiel, report back to Cybertron immediately. Bring your crew and all weapons. We are under attack..."

"Attack? By whom?"

"Unknown...Report with all speed! You have three megacycles before the time window closes."

"Acknowledge." My hands trembled with excitement. Whatever was going on, it sounded big.

There was a moment of silence, and then... "Agent Samiel, if there are no survivors of the Council, you are authorized as new Predacon leader."

My optics must have bulged. "Say again?"

"If there are no Council members surviving upon your arrival, you are new Predacon leader. Predacons Forever. Tri-Predacus Council out."

I spun around to see Harrier standing flabbergasted behind me. "Did you hear that?" I asked, uncertain if I'd imagined it all.

He nodded, dumbfounded. "What in the Pit could be happening to them?"

My mind raced. I didn't know. I knew the Council had never fully trusted me, and no wonder...having once been a Decepticon leader, they could hardly expect me to be a cheerful follower of orders, and my...betrayal? treachery? I never thought of it that way--it was simply one group challenging another, to discover which was the stronger and therefore which deserved to survive...my ACTION against Artemis Prime left the Council nervous that they might suffer the same fate. Hardly. My crew was not nearly powerful enough to make challenging the Council a viable option at this time...

...and now, they'd gone ahead and elected me their successor.

Dire straits indeed. Whatever it was that was happening to them, if they died, they wanted the Predacon empire in the hands of someone who knew how to lead. In the hands of someone who was no stranger either to adversity, or to triumphing over it.

I suddenly had a very bad feeling.

"Call in Laserbeak and Buzzsaw. Tell them to ready the starcruiser." My face was grim as my brain raced. Speed was vital--the coordinates I'd been given showed that the time window would be closing in three megacycles--but we couldn't afford to forget anything important. "I want you to load all our extra fuel on board while I check the weapons systems. We're going home...and it looks like we'll find something ugly waiting for us."

All the time I'd spent worrying about Megatron, and suddenly he was forgotten in the blink of an eye. I had to trust the Maximals to take care of him. Whatever was going on at home on Cybertron, it was now my number one priority.

Even I had no idea how bad it would get.

***

We took off two and a half megacycles later. Braddore was not aboard--I'd sent out a call, but the albatross Predacon had been either unable or unwilling to reach our cruiser in time. A pity, but I now had larger concerns than Braddore. Harrier, Laserbeak, Buzzsaw and myself went screaming through the intertemporal portal created by our trans-warp drive, and arrived on a world of desolation.

"Good Primus," Harrier said as he stood at my side, looking out the front portal. "What could have happened?"

"It looks like Kilair," I whispered. Unbidden, Harrier reached over and clasped my hand.

There was no sign of life in the ruins as Buzzsaw and Laserbeak guided the star cruiser to a landing in the only undamaged docking bay left at Predacon High Command. The only sound was a mournful cry made from the breeze that wound its way over the empty buildings. Everywhere around us, the landscape bore the signs of laser fire and high explosives, even the ornate facade of Predacon High Command, seat of the Tri-Predacus Council.

"Maximals?" Buzzsaw whispered.

I shook my head. The Maximals would never provoke a war with the Predacons. Maximals were pacifistic, weak. It was not their way to challenge their military superiors.

"Quintessons?" Harrier murmured. He remembered the Occupation.

"Perhaps." That theory made logical sense. Of course, there was only one way to know for certain.

I left Laserbeak and Buzzsaw to guard the star cruiser while Harrier and I went into the Command building. I never saw them, or the cruiser, again. If they were smart, they would have gotten back into the cruiser and set a course for a quiet little planet where they could live free of the menace that has enslaved Cybertron. If they were not...well, their fate was probably the same as that of...

Harrier and I transformed to beast mode and worked our way up through the hallways, clambering over piles of rubble in the corridors until we reached the main council chamber. Like the rest of the building, it was empty, and our scanners were picking up no signs of life.

"It's eerie," Harrier muttered. "This place shouldn't be so quiet."

Me, I think I've got a bit of the old Decepticon arrogance. I took advantage of the situation to flop back in one of the Council chairs and enjoy the view across the board table.

Harrier hopped onto the seat beside me, grinning a foxhound grin. "I must say, old girl, I never thought I'd ever end up here."

"Me neither." I stretched my wings. "Well, to business. Samiel, terrorize!"

Nothing happened.

Harrier blinked at me. I tried again. "Samiel, TERRORIZE!"

Again, nothing.

"What's happening?" my old friend asked, suddenly concerned.

"I can't transform," I said, examining myself as if the reason for my problem would be visually evident. "You try."

"Harrier, TERRORIZE!" Although he spoke the code, he sat there just as before, a cute little foxhound rather than a robot warrior. We spent a few klicks blinking at each other while the truth of the situation sank in.

Finally I shook it off. "We're not getting anywhere like this. The most important thing is to determine what became of the Council and the other Predacons. We can get Buzzsaw to work on the glitch in our transformation codes later."

"Easy for you to say. You've got hands." Harrier rested his paws on the console and watched, somewhat enviously, as I used the little hands on my wings to manipulate the buttons on the main computer.

"What can I say, I'm a highly evolved life form."

"Is that the reason archaeopteryxes are extinct on Earth?"

We laughed, mostly from force of habit--it was an old running joke--but part of my mind was thinking that I was about to become extinct on Cybertron if I couldn't figure out what was going on.

Then the file I'd been loading opened, and the image of the Council's bat-faced elder appeared. A synthesized voice spoke from a speaker somewhere in the room.

"To those Predacons who hear this...You are the last of the Resistance. Megatron has returned, bringing with him an army of drones and a virus that can trap us in beast mode. We know no cure for the virus. In beast mode we fight him, but he has captured much of the planet. Our news is inaccurate--his drones took out our communications towers within a week of his first strike--but when last we heard, the Maximal Council of Elders had fallen and even now, Megatron's drones are beating on Predacon High Command's very door. Flee, reorganize, regroup and reclaim our planet, or we are doomed. Your leader is Agent Samiel. She is an experienced soldier. Follow her... We give you all we know of Megatron and his drones. It is precious little, but it is the best we have."

Harrier nudged me with his nose as a list of files appeared on the computer. "Megatron did all this?"

"Perhaps we shouldn't have left it to the Maximals to look after him after all." I allowed myself a smirk before I became serious. "Something evidently went wrong with the time warp. We left Earth before he did, but his later trans-warp tunnel must have opened earlier in the time stream, so that he arrived on Cybertron in advance of us."

"And we're trapped in beast mode."

I shoved a disk into the computer and began downloading the files. "We'll go back to the cruiser. Buzzsaw can probably fix our systems, and in the meantime, Laserbeak can go through this information..."

And that's when we heard the sound of heavy machinery in the corridor.

"Out the window," I hissed. Whatever it was, it sounded big and we were at a disadvantage in our beast modes. My wing hands, though small and clumsy, were still capable of holding my laser and firing a shot through the window of the council chamber. I drew a feather sword from my wing, cursing the awkwardness of my little hands, and used the blade to clear the glass from around the edges of the window ledge before sheathing it.

Meanwhile, the information had finished downloading. Harrier fumbled with his paws before he finally succeeded in ejecting the disk. He grasped it in his teeth, opened his VTOL turbines, and carefully stored the disk in a pouch at his side where the turbines normally rested. Firing his engines, he rose off the floor and out the window. I followed...

...and suddenly they were upon us, aircraft, a good dozen of them, built like a cross between spaceships and the old Seeker ' models that resembled Terran F-'5s. The sky was filled with laser blasts that fell like rain.

"Split up!" I cried. Immediately, Harrier dove for the ground, jinking to avoid the drones' fire. They were much faster than he was; several flew right past him and turned, flying upwards, catching him in a net of lasers. Thinking quickly, he shut off his turbines and plummeted into free-fall, dropping out of their trap, firing his engines at the last moment to keep himself from impacting on the ground.

Me, I was armed. I still had two missiles hung in the wings of my avian mode, and I used them to good effect, taking down a pair of aerodrones. But there was still another one after me, and added to that jet was the group which had evidently given up on Harrier. I was out of missiles--could I hold my laser in one wing hand and still fly?

I gave it a shot, but it made maneuvering awkward and my aim left a lot to be desired. Still, I kept the aerodrones back while Harrier ran in circles below, yipping and barking, trying to distract the drones. I shot down one when it made a dive at Harrier. Then one of its companions got lucky and clipped my right wing. The laser flew out of my hand; both it and I went tumbling end over end to the ground below.

I hit the ground hard and lay there, flat like a rug, the wind knocked out of me. I struggled to force some breath into my air intakes, into my lungs. Harrier touched down nearby, an expression of concern on his face, and then his ears pricked up and his look became one of alarm and fear.

There was something rumbling up behind me. I raised my head. A tank drone, its massive treads tearing into the pavement, gouging the ground with the spikes that gave it traction. Its front bumper opened up to reveal a series of whirling sawblades. It was only a few feet away, heading right for me. Scrabbling on wings and talons, I tried to get airborne and almost succeeded.

It ran over a few feathers on the tip of my right wing (damage: minimal) and caught the lower portion of my right leg in its blades (damage: extreme). I let out a shrill of agony as its claws ground my leg to meat. Ribbons of slicing pain ripped through my mind, alternating with waves of comforting oblivion. I had to fight to stay awake, to stay conscious, to stay alive...

Harrier was essentially unarmed. His teeth and claws, though sharp, could do no appreciable damage to the thick metal skin of the tank. Still, he wasted no time leaping onto the tank, ducking beneath the barrel so that it could not fire at him, and doing his best. He got nowhere. Perhaps he could have popped a hatch and ripped out its wiring, but I believe he was distracted, by me.

Giving up on the tank, he took my tail in his teeth and helped to hoist me into the air until the tank had passed by. That was when I blacked out for a moment, falling to the ground, and Harrier could not keep his grip on me. I fell; he landed neatly beside me. As I came around, I noticed Harrier glancing back at the tank. It was lumbering about behind us, attempting to turn itself around for a second pass. I clamped my jaw shut, feeling my needle-like archaeopteryx teeth biting into my lips and not caring. It took all my energy not to moan. Harrier was talking to me, and though I do not remember the words, the tone of his voice was concerned and comforting.

Then his head jerked up. "Slag," he whispered, his voice choked, "there's more coming! We've got to get out of here...can you fly?"

"I can hardly move," I groaned, but I reached out my wings and wrapped them around his neck, clasping my little wing hands together. He unfolded his VTOL turbines, using them to help scoop me onto his back. As the tanks came nearer, Harrier fired his engines and rose up off the ground, lifting me out of range.

"Maybe I can fly," I said as we soared overtop of the tanks.

"No, you can't," Harrier answered firmly. "It was a stupid question."

"I think..."

He could feel me loosening my grip in preparation to test my wings. "Tempest, no. You're very badly wounded."

I knew it was bad for two reasons. First, that Harrier would presume to give me an order, and secondly, because he always called me Tempest when he had a serious point to make. I decided not to argue with him. I was in considerable pain, I was getting a free ride, and I was putting all my strength into fighting the waves of nausea that were rolling over me.

I wonder if Harrier would have noticed the bike drones if I hadn't been talking.

They were below us, a whole pack of them, but I didn't see them until they started shooting at us. One of them got lucky and put a laser blast right through Harrier's turbine. We fell, only a few feet, but it was far enough. A tongue of painful fire leapt up from my shredded leg and I flickered out of consciousness.

I came to moments later, to Harrier licking my face and shaking me. "Wake up, Tempest, wake up!" He shot an agitated glance over his shoulder.

I looked up. Cycle drones, surrounding us, schooling like sharks and closing in for the kill.

"Last stand," I said grimly, flopping into a sitting position. I struggled to draw my blades, vowing to take down as many drones as I could before they killed me. I remember thinking, ~and so it ends. So ends Tempest of Kilair.~

I had known this day was coming. Perhaps the greatest surprise was that it did not happen long ago. And, it was not a bad way to die--boldly in battle with my best friend at my side.

"Get ready to fly," Harrier said. "Fly back to the cruiser."

I left my wing blades undrawn. "Fly? What..."

"Fly!" Harrier barked, suddenly seizing me by the scruff of his neck and firing his turbines. We rocketed upwards, crookedly and on a diagonal path thanks to the fact that only one engine was working properly, but rose we did...and then Harrier released me. I spread my wings, feeling the currents of air catch me and hold me aloft.

The cycles transformed and started firing up at us, but Harrier cut his engines and dived on them, snarling, leading their fire into others of the pack, making them shoot their own kind.

A clever diversion. Once again, Harrier had proven himself a remarkable soldier. He would have made a magnificent leader in his own right, but no, he had always preferred to fight by my side.

I began heading back to the shuttle, knowing that Harrier would lose the cycle drones in the maze of streets and then join me there. I might...I WOULD be able to fix my damage in the meantime using the shuttle's CR chamber.

And then I heard the long, agonized howl rising behind me.

Harrier. I spun around in midair, heedless of the pain in my leg. I folded my wings and dived like a hawk towards the cluster of Vehicons far ahead of me. The bikes, however, were already leaving, and in my exhausted condition I was unable to pursue them.

And my more immediate concern lay unmoving on the ground.

I landed beside Harrier. His turbines were extended; both rotors were blackened. I can only assume his good engine took a hit and dropped him to the ground. His back was scorched by laser fire; there was a gaping hole in his chest. His optics were glassy and wide with shock.

"Harrier?" I whispered, wincing as I touched my wounded leg to the earth. "Harrier?"

Silence.

"HARRIER, GET UP, DAMN YOU! Damn you..."

I ran the systems check automatically. The computerized voice replied tonelessly, "Unit Harrier non-operational. Function has been terminated."

My voice was a low moan. "Harrier..."

I'd killed him once. Thought I'd killed him once. Now I'd killed him again. He would have gotten away if it hadn't been for me, if he hadn't been trying to distract those drones from me.

I'm not proud to say what I did next. I should have gotten back to the shuttle, tried the CR chamber, but my wings were heavy, my body ached and there was a dullness in my heart. I was so tired, so alone, and in the future I saw nothing but despair on a world already ruined beyond redemption.

I hung my head and cried.

Sometime later, my systems had mercy on me, and stasis lock kicked in.

***

When I came around, I was surprised to be alive. With injuries like mine, I should have leaked to death.

Survivor. I am always the survivor.

My internal repairs systems had fixed my wings, but they'd barely made a start on my leg. All they'd been able to do is stop the bleeding blood and fuel; the intense damage remained.

And Harrier was still dead.

I never had the opportunity to recycle him. He would have wanted a state funeral, rites with full honours, as would befit a Duke of Decepticons. I would have given it to him if I could. Instead, on this world and in these circumstances, I had to leave him.

I crawled to a ledge, using my wing hands and left leg to push myself along the ground and up onto an overhang. From there I could jump off and spread my wings, catching the air currents.

I circled three times above my fallen friend. Far below, I could see the pathetic little foxhound body lying in a rumpled heap. It was wrong to see him so still and quiet; he had always been so full of life.

Life...belongs to the living...a survivor has no time to waste mourning the dead.

I was tired of being a survivor.

Something in me caused me to head back to the star cruiser. I suppose survival had become instinctual for me. I did what I needed to do without ever questioning why.

When I returned to the docks, the star cruiser was gone, and so were Laserbeak and Buzzsaw. What happened, I don't know, nor may I ever. I sat there, mildly shocked, and then realizing with some surprise that I didn't particularly care.

The time of the Predacons was over. A new era was dawning. Outmoded, outgunned, I was in essence already dead. It was only a matter of waiting for the final act of closure.

I was curled up on the docks, fading in and out of consciousness, when the Maximals found me.

***


	2. Chapter 2

**WHITE FLAGS**

**Chapter Two of Four**

I was barely awake for the reformatting. It was done right there on the spot by Optimus Primal. It was just my luck--or misfortune--that I'd been found by Mr. Humanitarian. Pantera would have, in all probability, left me to die.

As I flickered in and out of consciousness, I was able to hear the conversations of five Maximals. Four were vaguely familiar; one was a stranger to me. I managed to piece together a rough idea of what had happened: Vehicons, sparkless perfection, a base in the Citadel. When I came fully around, I found myself lying on a rough cot in an antechamber to a larger room. I could hear the voices of Primal's Maximals arguing.

"...still don't know why you bothered with that lousy Pred," came a voice with a New York accent.

"Shut up, Rattrap," barked a female. "You know I was a Predacon once too."

A sigh from someone else. "Optimus, I'm afraid I'm going to have to go with Rattrap on this one. I heard enough about Samiel during the Beast Wars. Primus only knows what she might do."

"Cheetor, I understand your concern." That was the big ape, sounding exhausted. "But now the difference between Maximal and Predacon is minimal. Megatron wiped out both when he took over the planet. Like her or not, Samiel is now on our side."

Megatron. So that's what happened.

Dammit.

This was my fault.

I was the one sent by the Tri-Predacus Council to capture Megatron. I failed. Instead, he moved through the time stream in a way that produced this ruined world...

...damn it, damn Tri-Predacus Council! If I'd stayed on Earth instead of responding to their distress call, maybe I could have killed Megatron and made sure this future never came to pass!

Too late, Tempest. You didn't kill him, and now you pay the price.

They sent Ravage before me, and then Pantera...but I cannot blame them. I was the third, and final, Tri-Predacus operative. My chance. My fault. My punishment.

I knew that I was about to suffer greatly for my folly.

I flopped upright--an archaeopteryx on the ground is not a very graceful creature--and tried, once more, to transform. Nothing. Cursing under my breath, I hopped off the bed, spreading my wings in a glide to the ground and landing in the doorway on my strong leg.

"Well, well," Rattrap said, with a nod at me, "looks like Sleeping Beauty's awake."

My eyes--not optics, eyes--looked around the room, at the weird new bodies which the Maximals in the room inhabited, and then I looked down at myself and let out a cry.

My feet had their old razor-sharp titanium talons, but the foot structure was some kind of weird organic...FLESH...construct laced at the joints by rotors; my wing hands were the same. My wings had metallic feathers attached to an organic superstructure, though I suspected, or hoped, that the interior structure was metal rather than bone. I craned my head and caught a glimpse of a reflection in glass, a reflection of a neck cased in segmented armour, a flesh head with a metal crest, a metallic chestplate oddly reminiscent of my old Seeker form, and organic haunches... I caught a glimpse of bone protruding from my mangled leg and looked away.

"What have you done to me?" I hissed at Optimus Primal.

"He saved your life," Cheetor growled.

"I didn't ask you," I shot back, then returned my attention to the ape.

"I reformatted you," Primal explained. "It's the will of the Oracle. And it's the only way to escape the effects of Megatron's virus."

"That," Black Arachnia clarified, "was what had trapped you in your beast mode and was slowly shutting down your systems."

I looked down at my right leg--Primus, ground hamburger and bone splinters--and when I lifted my gaze, my eyes met Rattrap's. Even the rat seemed subdued. "Wasn't nothing we could do about that," he said, almost apologetically.

"So I'm a cripple then."

"There are ways around that," Optimus said, in an attempt to be reassuring. "We're going to need someone to watch our base, run the equipment we've managed to salvage, take care of the orchard..."

"And what about fuel?"

"We'll bring you some back."

"So. You're going to be going out on strike raids, while I'll be kept home in the base, dependent on you to feed me."

"You can't fight in your condition."

"And so I'm to sit back and let you do all the fighting for me?"

"What else are you going to do?" Cheetor demanded impatiently.

I gritted my teeth. "Go out and die. As I would have, if you hadn't interfered."

"Hey, we saved your life!"

"Then you made a mistake, didn't you?" I leaned forward, trying to stare Cheetor down.

The stranger, a blue bat, spoke up. "You'd rather be dead?"

"Death is looking better and better right now. Would you rather end up like this?" I gestured down at my leg. "I'm sure it could be arranged..." I smiled, a sweetly poisonous grin, revealing a mouthful of teeth like fishbones. I was privately amused when the bat-boy shrank back behind Black Arachnia for protection.

"Don't be ridiculous," Black Arachnia said. "You can't even transform."

"And you can?"

"Yes."

"So why are you all sitting around looking like a day at the zoo?"

"Megatron's Vehicons can't detect us in beast mode," the bat retorted, still keeping well back.

"Point taken," I admitted grudgingly. "So how do I transform then?" My voice was sarcastic, but I really did want to know--though I hoped I had kept my eagerness hidden.

"You have to concentrate." The spider bot approached me slowly. "Just like the first Transformers, you have to learn how to transform yourself. You need to find your stillpoint."

"My what?"

"A mental state of perfect calm and peace."

I blinked. "There's no such thing as perfect peace."

"As long as you keep thinking that way, you're not going to get anywhere."

"Another part of the game," I said with an icy grin. "Can I live long enough to figure out how to transform, or will the Vehicons eat me first?"

Optimus Primal laid a hand on my wing. "Samiel, don't think that way."

"Primal, right now, there's only one thing I want." An image of Harrier's still body flickered through my mind. "I want you to find Megatron and hurt him. Hurt him bad. If what you said is true, then he has cheated--seeking to eliminate the war for survival by wiping out sentient life." I laughed a little. "Though I suppose he has succeeded in prolonging his own survival in a way I can't help but admire."

All the hair rose along the back of Cheetor's neck. "He won't survive for long once we get ahold of him."

"Rightly so. He'll grow soft, without anything to compete against." My eyes narrowed. "I want you to take him down..." I swallowed hard "...and the best way for you to do that is for you to not be bothered with a cripple like me."

Now all five Maximals were staring at me, shocked.

"What are you saying?" Primal whispered.

"I'm saying that I would only hold you back. You can't have that much fuel to spare and you don't need to waste it on a cripple who can't fight, can't even transform..."

"It took some of us a long time to learn to transform."

I noticed Rattrap's look of shame and couldn't help but feel a private thrill as I smirked knowingly at the rodent, letting him know I'd figured out his little secret.

"You don't have time to waste on me," I retorted.

"If you go, you will die!"

"Hey, let her go," Cheetor said. "If she wants to go get herself slagged it's no concern of ours."

"All life is precious," Optimus argued back, "and independent sparks are all too rare on Cybertron these days."

"Think of your success," I urged Primal. "Even you cannot deny that your troops will be more effective if you don't need to waste your time worrying about me."

"Then what will you do?"

"Live. Die. Whatever." I turned my back on them. "It's not my choice. It's up to the law of the jungle."

Part of me expected one of the Maximals to try to stop me, but none of them did.

***

I made my way up to the surface and stared up at the star-strewn sky. The blackness of space was unchanged; the stars still twinkled coldly in the night, heedless of the events on Cybertron. My satisfaction at having bested Primal quickly gave way to trepidation. The loneliness I'd fought him for was now mine.

I squared my shoulders, flapped my wings and managed to get myself airborne, soaring through the deserted streets of Cybertron in search of my own doom.

I flew along, deep in thought. Primus, I didn't want to die--but I was crippled, and I could not bring down the strong with me. The best thing I could do to hurt Megatron was to stay out of the Maximals' way.

In the interim, what to do? I began looking around for a fuel dump, or perhaps the ruins of a bar somewhere where I could get some energon. My reserves were getting low.

I searched for several megacycles, with no success, when they found me again. The Vehicons. A squadron of four jet drones out on patrol.

Damn Maximals, they hadn't restocked my missiles! And then I realized with a shock that this techno-organic body didn't carry any. I might--MIGHT--still have my feather blades, but in order to draw them with my wing hands, I'd have to land. Landing on my crippled leg would leave me an easy target for the jets. My best hope would be to outfly them.

I sped through the streets, jinking and twisting, avoiding their laser blasts. None of their shots hit me, but neither could I manage to shake them. I was simply too tired and too low on fuel; my head began throbbing and I wished I'd at least taken a few solar cycles to recover in the Maximal base...

...no...

...you are weak, Tempest, and now you die.

My best chance was the hope that the Vehicons were as low on fuel as I was, but that hope was a small one. They seemed to have plenty of juice to burn, and they were closing in on me.

Last stand, Tempest.

Looking ahead, I chose my spot--a small dead-end alley. Walls on each side, preventing the Vehicons from flanking me. An alley too small for a jet drone to swoop down behind me. I soared down into the alley, spinning around as I landed. My feathers and crest rose as I attempted to make myself look as fierce as possible. I glared at the Vehicons as they slowly approached me. They were going to pay dearly for their kill...

...and in that moment, and a strange calm came over me. Everything was settled for me now. I would fight them until the strongest prevailed.

It took me a moment to realize that I had become taller, that both my wing hands and a pair of techno-organic hands were stretched out in front of me.

I was transformed.

I reached back for my wings, found the familiar handles of my feather swords, and drew the long slim blades. Those Vehicons were going to get the fight of their lives...

The first two jets became impatient and screamed after me. I leapt into the air, avoiding their fire, and dived on the first jet. I landed on its back and almost went down. An arrow of pain shot up my right leg and I realized with some dismay that I was crippled in robot mode as well.

No matter. Survive while you can.

The second jet was firing at both me and its partner. I spread my wings, lifting off as the second jet's lasers destroyed the first plane. Then I dived on the second jet, ripping a line down its underbelly with my blades. Sparking, it fell out of the fight.

Vehicons Three and Four were closing in on me now. I stayed airborne, realizing that my bad leg was of little disadvantage as long as I stayed off the ground. I folded my wings, diving back into the maze of streets, and finally got out of the Vehicon's sights for a moment. I ducked into a doorway, my blades in my hands, waiting.

The Vehicons would find me, quickly, for I was not in beast mode...and I was counting on that. There. A flexible cockpit poked into the street, followed by the rest of the Vehicon...

I crouched on the ground. It hadn't spotted me yet. It knew I was there, but it wasn't quite sure where. Its first hint as to my location came when I threw a feather blade upward into its belly. Screeching, it transformed--just in time for my other blade to chop its head off.

Its companion arrived too late to save it. The final Vehicon transformed, firing a volley of lasers from my arm cannons. I dodged the fire, using my good leg to push myself off the ground and maneuvering with my wings.

Vehicons. Damned Vehicons.

I folded my wings, diving like a hawk, my sword held straight in front of me. The Vehicon looked up, startled, and shot at me. I didn't divert from my attack run. Its optics widened as it realized that I was making a kamikaze dive on it. It hovered there, as if trying to make up its mind whether to shoot more or to flee....and it was still thinking when I rammed my blade into its core processor.

It flopped around on the ground, twitching. I limped over to the decapitated Vehicon, drew my other sword out of its stomach, and dispatched the second one.

Alive. I was alive.

Better to revert to beast mode before any more Vehicons found me...

...but first...

With surgical precision, I slit the second Vehicon's chest open. There it was--a big fuel tank fat with fuel.

Cybertronians have always had a peculiar squeamishness about drinking others' fuel. Even most Decepticons shied away from consuming any fuel that had been in another's fuel tank. But that was how the scavengers of Tartarus survived on a daily basis--by killing and consuming each other--and that was how I'd lived on Tartarus for a good stellar cycle.

I'd learned to like the taste.

Vehicon has an unusual flavour, I learned as I poured the contents of the aerodrone's tank down my throat. Still, fuel was fuel, and I decided I could get accustomed to the tinny taste of Vehicon. I wasn't long in ripping the tank out of the second downed jet and quenching my hunger.

I dropped the second tank and stared down at the Vehicons thoughtfully. Not only were these two jets carrying lots of fuel, but also plenty of photon charges for those big lasers. On Tartarus, photon charges had been as scarce as fuel and the possession of a working laser weapon could mean all the difference between being the eater and being the eaten...

~No point in taking the charges. You haven't got any lasers.~

But that, too, was easily remedied. It was a matter of minutes for me to cut the two best lasers off the Vehicons. I fashioned makeshift armbands, mounting the lasers to my arms. It took a megacycle or so for me to rework the guns' wiring into manual triggers that I could fire using my wing hands; the Vehicons, evidently, used mental commands from their thought processors. The guns of my old Seeker form had worked the same way. Convenient, but I couldn't go messing about in my own mental processor and I would not ask the Maximals for help. Stupid Maximals. If they were willing to adapt the Vehicons' lasers, surely they would have done it themselves by now.

I'd barely finished when I heard another sound. Cycle drones, responding to the signal sent off by my robot form.

I stood there, grinning, waiting for them.

The first bike rounded the corner and was blown to pieces by a shot from my laser right in its fuel tank. Four more roared towards me, infuriated by the sight of a Maximal with guns.

I launched airborne, hovering overtop of them, and chose my targets carefully. I managed to shoot the tires out of three of them before their laser fire got too accurate. I dived, chased by the last working drone. Stupid drone--it was willing to follow me out of its crippled fellows' range of fire. It realized it was alone just as I suddenly folded my wings and landed neatly on its back, beheading it and popping its tire with my swords.

I went back to clean up the other three. They were crippled--so was I--but they weren't as smart as me, weren't as driven to survive. They'd transformed into sitting positions, ready to fire at me with their lasers.

I was mostly full. I had no need to take the risk of killing these Vehicons with swords. Instead, I aimed my lasers at the wall above their heads, burying them in an avalanche of concrete. Satisfied, I limped back to the beheaded cycle, where I replenished my lasers with its photon charges and sampled the somewhat more aluminum-tasting fuel in its tank.

Oh, Tempest, you're a harder target than even you thought.


	3. Chapter 3

**WHITE FLAGS**

**Chapter Three of Four**

And so I lived, never once questioning what for. The Vehicons were good eating, and every once in a while I found a fuel dump where I helped myself to energon. I realized that I preferred to feed on the Vehicons. I liked the hunt--liked closing in for the kill.

Both the Maximals and Megatron tended to leave me alone. Megatron said that his Vehicons would hunt me down sooner or later--of course they would, I was under no delusions about that--but he couldn't bother to deal with me himself. Even Optimus Primal had given up on me, allowing me to find my own way to hell. I do not blame the Maximals for having enough on their minds keeping themselves alive.

I once tried to make a deal with Megatron. I thought I could work my way up as I'd worked my way up through the ranks of the Decepticons. Megatron turned me down flat. He said...he said he had no use for a techno-organic cripple.

Idiot. If it is a war of attrition he wants, it is such a war he will get. He will waste more Vehicons on me than I am worth, and me...I have nothing else to do but fight.

There was one other. Starscream. Starscream was a light of hope, a chance that perhaps I could form another Phoenix Corps and make a new life for myself...

Pantera shot that down. Damn her. Pantera and that damned Vehicon Lancer interfered. Well, Pantera can keep her Maximals and her crusades for balance. Lancer can try his blades against mine, and on that day I will learn the taste of helicopter Vehicon. I, for one, will survive...

...alone...

...in a world of ruin...

...living only to kill for fuel, fuel to go on living, life to go on killing...

...alone.

The Maximals should have left me to die.

Would I were so lucky.

And here I stand, alone on the rooftops of Cybertropolis, looking out over the empty streets. Here and there the flicker of neon lights gleam out of the deep dark alleys, but, despite their reality, they are as good as illusion. There are no patrons in the bars, no shoppers in the stores, no families in the tenements. There is no life behind those lights. They glow atop the doorways to abandoned buildings. They continue to shine although there is no longer any reason for their existence. Wasting fuel to light up a city inhabited only by the Vehicons, who ignore the signs of the old order. Outmoded, useless, the lights burn on.

Outmoded, crippled, I survive, preying on the Vehicons for fuel when I can, sucking up the Maximals' small fuel reserves when I cannot. Throughout it all I must endure the hateful stares of the Maximals. They know who and what I am. The only ones to show me any mercy at all are Braddore and Stormrave--the heir of my onetime soldier Albacore and the reborn spark of my long-ago sister--but damn them, I don't want their mercy or anyone else's. I want their respect, or, if I cannot have that, their fear...not pity. Not mercy. Not generosity. I take what I need. I do not beg. I will not start begging now.

My best revenge on Megatron--the one who created this world--would be a Maximal victory. In my condition I can do nothing to aid the Maximals--as if they want my help. The best way for me to help them would be to stop taking their fuel and supplies.

I have lived too long.

Harrier, where are you? With no one left to hear, I cry it out to the abandoned city. "HARRIER!" The echos spring back at me from wall and bridge and barricade until it seems as if Cybertron calls with me.

Harrier, you idiot. You fool. You were in prime fighting condition. I was already injured beyond repair.

The law states survival of the fittest. You reneged on that law. You stayed behind and paid the ultimate price.

It should have been me.

The metal shell that covers my upper chest is a carapace, not actual flash. One of the more technological aspects of my new body, the shell is hard, save for the middle where a diamond-shaped inset of metal lies flush with the skin beneath the carapace. I hook my fingers into the diamond-shaped gap and pry the two halves of the metal covering apart. The hinges are below my arms, and the shell spreads outwards like double doors, revealing soft flesh crisscrossed with fuel lines. Several nozzles protrude from points on my rounded chest. I press my hand to the skin, feeling around until I locate the spot that seems to be above the fuel pump, or heart, or whatever I possess in this technoorganic shell.

I draw one of my feather blades from my right wing, toss it up and catch it in midair, not by the hilt but by the middle. I turn it around until the point pricks the spot I'd marked. I clasp the blade with both hands. The double edge is cutting my hands, but I don't care. I can see the thin red line where the tip is thirsting for my fuel.

I am no longer the fittest, no longer the survivor.

Let this end.

I drive the blade in slowly. It hurts and I must force myself not to tremble. I know I cannot finish the job this way, but if I can fix the blade reasonably straight, embed it a little, it will stay aligned when I fall upon it...

He phaseshifts out of nowhere. That damned Vehicon, Lancer, a small light helicopter equipped with Megatron's rendition of Ironhorse's dimensional phaseshifters. Lancer is almost the same height as Optimus Primal--small for a Vehicon--and possessing barely half Primal's body mass. The shifters are unable to transfer a large mass across the dimensions, forcing Megatron to build a little Vehicon body to carry them.

So Lancer is small, lightly armoured, and not very strong in robot mode. His main power is the lifting force of his rotor in vehicle form. But he's fast--desperately fast--and so, by the time I recognize that he's here, he's already grabbed my sword, torn it out of my grasp, and retreated several paces away across the rooftop. He's currently leaning on the sword and regarding me out of those eerie green optics.

In a way, Lancer reminds me of Chopper from the old days of Phoenix Corps. The body design is similar; in fact, the "blades" motif is even more evident in Lancer's robot mode. His rotor is a cross upon his back. His head is helmetlike, adorned with three blades; his face is an impassive blank mask above which the optics burn with intense light. His limbs are so thin as to be skeletal, so designed to save weight. He is painted in a garish purple and bright yellow-green. Dark colours are unnecessary for stealth tasks when one has the ability to hide in a parallel dimension.

Lancer has dogged me unceasingly since Megatron built him. Why, I haven't the faintest idea. All I know is that this Vehicon has disobeyed Megatron's orders, even surrendered tactical advantages, to pursue me. I would have a better ability to guess his motivations if he would only talk, but Lancer almost never speaks. None of the Maximals has an answer for the enigma behind those optics.

Lancer is not speaking now either, simply watching me as the blood from the cut on my chest runs down, over my stomach area, into the feathered skirt that encircles my waist.

"Wanna kill me, Vehicon?" I sneer. "Why don't I make it easy for you. Give me back my sword and I'll do the job for you. How about that?"

Silence, still. He seems badly confused. In his right hand he draws his rapier--and he is an expert with it--but he does not advance. His left hand still holds my blade.

Impatient, I decide to ignore him and draw my other sword from my left wing. Let the damned Vehicon watch.

I am not ready for his strike. A single blow from his rapier sends the feather sword flying from my grip and scuttling across the roof.

I am mostly annoyed. I would rather die by my own hand than give a Vehicon the satisfaction.

"Want to kill me yourself?" I growl, waiting. I must fight him on principle, but I am unarmed now. My bad leg puts me at a disadvantage on the ground, and in the air, I will make an easy target for a helicopter that can cloak and uncloak in any surroundings.

Lancer doesn't move.

"Damn you!" I growl at last, slamming my carapace closed, jumping as best I can and reverting to beast mode, flapping my wings and soaring off into the sky.

The last impression I get is that of the Vehicon holding my swords and watching me go. When I look back, I do not see him, but whether he is truly gone or merely cloaked, I cannot tell.

***

My chest is still bleeding as I fly though the streets, but I don't care. My throat is tight with rage. I once thought death was easy--one needed only to give in--and now, it seems that even that is denied me.

I am almost relieved to hear the beating rotors behind me. Project Lancer? Has he changed his mind?

I look back and receive a startled shock. It's a helicopter Vehicon, all right...but not Lancer. This is a big one, a double-rotored attack chopper, and it's got ten drones behind it.

When did Megatron build these?

"Take the Maximal down!" the leader orders. He himself hovers back as his troops go on the offensive.

Great. Another smart one. And ten drones--one crippled Maximal against ten drones.

Looks like I get my wish.

But something in my spark rebels at the idea of surrender to these automatons. The leader, perhaps I would let him kill me...but not drones. I will die at the hands of something intelligent, the hands of my physical and mental superior. Not at the hands of a mindless drone. I am still better than a drone.

There are, however, ten of them, and I don't have my swords on me any more. Lancer had taken them. I can't even use my lasers; I don't dare hold still long enough to turn and shoot. Gunfire whizzes past me as the drones close in.

I hear the leader's voice, distantly. "Obsidian to Strika. We have Samiel sighted. Ready your troops in case she goes to ground."

"Strika acknowledge."

"Lancer acknowledge."

Lancer. Dammit.

What am I going to do? I can't fight these drones alone, that's for certain, more are coming, and none of the Maximals would be willing to help me...but maybe...maybe I could take the choice away from them.

What if the helicopter drones came into their very base? Then the Maximals would have no CHOICE but to fight them off!

My own survival is paramount in my mind now, despite my earlier thoughts of suicide. Force of habit, I suppose. I search about for a sewer grate, dive into the underground, set a course for the Maximal base. I can hear the Vehicons behind me.

I feel no guilt for what I do. This is war. This is survival of the fittest. For a moment, I feel a brief concern that the Maximals may have moved their base--guerilla wars are fought much more effectively if the group never stays in the same place for more than a few solar cycles. Then I recall that such is not the Maximal way.

I snort. I'm doing the Maximals a favour by giving away the location of their base. They'll be much more viable if they don't tie themselves down to a fixed base...

I burst into the main cavern of the Maximal base with the Vehicons right behind me.

Well, now, look who's here...if it isn't Pantera. She's in deep conversation with Rattrap and a robot I do not recognize, one who looks like nothing so much as a big flower.

"Who is that?" the plant-bot asks.

Rattrap rolls his optics. "Botanica, meet Samiel, Cybertron's greatest pain in the tail."

Pantera's already on her feet, hissing at me as I fly between the pillars of the Oracle. "What are you doing here?" she demands.

"Draw your weapons," I retort. "Company's coming."

"You don't give us orders," the feline female snaps, but then her ears pick up the noise in the caverns.

"Chopper drones!" Rattrap cries. "She's led them right to our base!"

"Damn you!" Pantera growls, but now the helicopter drones are attacking, taking up her attention. Other Maximals...Primal, Black Arachnia, Silverbolt, Cheetor...are responding to the attack, but so has something else. I count six purple multi-wheeled truck drones rolling through the doorway...no. Five drones, and a general.

"Flank the Maximals and take them down!" the general barks, and I recognize the voice...the one on the radio who called herself Strika.

The arriving Maximals have barely a second to shoot me dirty looks before they're embroiled in the battle. I shrug. I didn't come to make them do all my fighting for me, and so I charge into the fray, firing my lasers, downing two of the helicopter drones and blowing up a truck drone, guns blazing until my photon charges are gone.

And then, in front of the Oracle, the dimensional fabric warps and a small Vehicon appears. Project Lancer. The stealth warrior is doing precious little in the way of fighting. He simply hovers there, observing. Every once in a while, as if to fulfill some obligation, he uses his nose cannon to fire a few halfhearted shots at the Maximals. Mostly, though, he is watching...watching me.

Damn him...damn those cold eyes on me. Who the hell are you, Lancer? Why do you follow me everywhere I go?

I've had about enough of you.

I aim my guns at him and squeeze the trigger, only to hear two empty shots. I'm out of ammo. Unarmed, crippled, with nothing to do but wait to see if I'll be saved or if I'll die...

One of Lancer's shots detonates right behind Nightscream, sending the blue bat somersaulting into a wall. The Maximals look up, gasp as they sight Lancer. Pantera calls directions that cannot be heard over the noise of battle.

Damn you, Maximals. I was never anything but a curse to you. You would never in the least expect me to lift a finger to help you.

Shows how well you know me.

I'm not going to depend on the Maximals to save me...and I'm not going to let that accursed Vehicon stalk me any longer. Just to spite you, Pantera...just to rid myself of Lancer...

...just...just maybe, to end this pain on my own terms.

I fold my wings, aim my beak at the stealth Vehicon, and loose my battle cry. My scream rips through the air, shaking the leaves in the technoorganic orchard, echoing to the roof above. Lancer jerks to a stop in midair, hovering there, seemingly looking about for the source of the sound. He looms larger and larger in my field of vision.

I don't even try to slow myself. Instead, I aim the center of my body mass at the base of his rotor and strike with full impact.

My wings flare, automatically, mingling with the blades of his rotor. My feathers strike his rotor and on both sides, metal bends. My wings snap and fold. His rotor loses a blade; the others bow and cannot keep purchase on the air. The force of the impact drives him down, and with my wings no longer capable of holding me aloft, I follow him in his dive to earth.

I impact on the bridgeway. Lancer, propelled by the berserk force of his own rotor, follows a longer trajectory that sends him crashing into the heart of the Oracle.

The Maximals are running towards me. Rattrap, Cheetor, Nightscream...

...Pantera.

I am pleased by the incredulous expressions on their faces. Especially Pantera's. Never thought I'd make a hero, did you, Arty?

My shell is a mass of agony. I can feel broken bones, splintered wings. I lie in a puddle of my own mingled blood and fuel; it pools around me. I scream as the pain intensifies...and then, dullness. My pain receptors are shutting down from the trauma. My vision hazes in and out.

I've done it. I'm dying.

Strika herself is charging me, flanked by her handful of remaining drones. The purple general is in an angry mood. She raises her weapon, points it towards me, cursing me...

I am as good a soldier as you, Strika. Now do me a favour. End my life.

And then a long blue blade buries itself in her chest. The Vehicon general bellows in pain, sends her troops forward, but she herself is retreating. She rips out the blade, throws it across the room, and disappears into the tunnel. The Maximals are staring somewhere behind me, for that is where the sword came from. None of them ever carried a weapon like that.

I...I did. That was my sword.

Who threw it?

But I cannot raise my head, cannot even keep my eyes focused as the hot waves of pain pierce through my numbing fog and wash over me. My mind is slipping away and I am too tired to care. Let it end. Oblivion will be a mercy. I do not care if I die by the hands of the Vehicons, the Maximals, or of my own wounds.

Around me, the Vehicons fall...driven back by a shadow of fury, a swordsman with long silver blades...until through my fading vision I think I see the last truck drone escaping, the last drone left alive. Somehow, though, I cannot care. My body is on fire. I cannot even care about the creature now by my side, when he starts whimpering at the extent of my injuries, beginning to pick me up as my mind falls away...

***

Limbo.

Is this death?

It's not the oblivion I had hoped for. Everything is insubstantial, hazy, but I'm still thinking, and I can still feel. Every once in a while arrows of pain torment me. Other times, I am floating, safe and warm, free of cares. The two extremes are bizarre.

Snatches of intelligible sensations fade in and out.

Sometimes I smell the sterilized odours of a medical laboratory, murmurs that might be Braddore or Albacore...Decepticon, Predacon, Maximal...or all at once? Time is mingled, meaningless. Is the medic working on me? Or has he declared my spark extinguished?

Sometimes, I sense others around me, but I cannot identify them. There are moments of dark, moments of light. At one of these I struggle to open my eyes and see an unfamiliar sight--a pair of brown and amber eyes looking into mine. I cannot see the face, but the eyes are warm and hopeful...then I black out again.

And I know fuel, delicious and already warm, pouring down my throat and carrying the flavour that I know means that I am drinking it not out of an energon cube or conventional fuel source, but out of another living body. Whoever I am feeding on does not seem to mind. In my clearer moments, I feel arms around me, cradling me, holding my mouth to the fuel lines...

...who would ever feed me out of his own fuel supply? It is an idea utterly abhorrent to most of our kind, a behaviour considered sick and repulsive. All my life I held silent about this perverted little taste of mine. It is also dangerous...hungry as I am, I could drink this robot's fuel cells dry and kill him. He, or she, is either fearless or has not considered the risk.

I seem to remember being gently pushed back when he determined I'd taken enough. I whimpered, hungry for more. Instead, I felt a blanket wrapping me round, arms pulling me near, though my questing mouth found only cool steel panels and...fur?

Before I can be certain, reality fades once again into insubstantial darkness.

***

I flicker, now. Flicker in and out of sanity. This is one of my more lucid moments. I look up and my eyes focus upon a figure. Albacore...Braddore.

"Braddore?" I mutter. My mind is a web of pain.

"Lie still, Samiel," the albatross replies. "You're still in very rough shape."

Alone. The albatross is working brusquely and professionally. Whatever I had dreamed of--the warmth by my side, the gentle touch, the amber eyes--is not here. Is not real.

This world is too cold. More pain shoots through me.

"Let me go," I mumble dully.

"What?"

"I said, let me die."

Braddore stares at me blankly. "Samiel..."

"Damn you, Braddore...Albacore, you're not doing me any favours! Let me die!"

"How dare you," he hisses, his frame shaking with anger. I don't think I'd ever seen the mild-mannered medic so furious before. "Who in the Pit gave you the power to decide who lives and who dies?"

I stare at him. In this moment he does not sound the least like Albacore.

"Dammit, Albacore, you'll do as I say!"

"I'm not Albacore," he retorts. "And I'm not Zodiac either."

"What the..."

"I'm an amalgam, Samiel or Tempest or whatever you call yourself. Half Albacore of the Decepticons, half Zodiac of the Autobots, combined into someone new. Braddore."

"If you cared about me at all, you'd let me die."

"I love Stormrave," he snaps back, setting one last dial and stalking out of the room.

Stormrave. The red Vehicon.

Albacore, I'd thought he was a reincarnation of Albacore. Albacore, my loyal lieutenant in the Decepticon Rebellion. What had he said? He was partially Albacore?

No, I don't care who he is. The point is, he's Stormrave's...not mine.

I am alone.

I turn my back on the door and curl up in a ball, praying for oblivion. I don't want to live. Primus, I'm worse off now than I was before--every breath is hot agony and the Maximals hate me more than ever. I am alone and broken.

Unconsciousness takes its time arriving. I can feel the moisture of a single tear on my cheek as I grit my teeth against an agony that comes from somewhere far deeper than my ruined body. I feel an eternity of falling through infinite blackness; I see all the turned backs of those who refuse to catch me. Oblivion is, once again, a mercy...I do not fear the ebbing of my consciousness or the dull throb in my limbs. I fear only my reawakening.

***

I'm waking up again.

Dammit.

I try to hold onto the comforting void, but it fades away on me, marooning me on this bed with my broken limbs and shattered spark. I am ruined and...

...no, this time I'm not alone.

I feel the warmth next to me. I blink and see him looking down at me. He's a stranger. I try to focus in on the eyes--eyes, not red optics but real eyes with amber pupils.

Is he a stranger?

The concern those eyes reflect reminds me of one person and one person alone.

"Harrier?" I muttered, dreamy, knowing even as I said it that such a thing was impossible.

"Tempest?"

The voice. Tenor, with a slight British-style accent...

...and he knew my name.

I tried to sit up, only to have the world spin violently around me and my vision black out.

"Harrier?" I repeated sharply as I sagged back on the bed.

"Tempest, lie down," he said softly, and then... "Yes. It's me."

"How?" As my vision returned, I saw a profile very different from the Harrier I remembered.

In his original form, Harrier had been a jump-jet Decepticon, painted green and brown with light blue trim. He'd been easily distinguishable by his handsome, narrow face and the wedge-shaped helmet on his head. In the Beast Wars, he had retained most of his facial features, though his colouration had become the white and brown of a foxhound, with blue and green trim on his robot mode.

The face that looks down at me now is almost completely canine, with long, regal ears and a slim muzzle. Still, some of the features--the spot over the right eye and the lock of chestnut hair curling over the forehead--were strongly reminiscent of Harrier's old beast mode. And the warmth in the eyes is the same.

"Tempest," he whispers in a voice I know so well.

Harrier. Alive.

Alive.


	4. Chapter 4

**WHITE FLAGS**

**Chapter Four of Four**

One minute, he was looking down at Samiel in concern and the next thing Harrier knew, she had both her arms wrapped around his neck and was kissing him firmly and passionately full on the lips. It didn't take her very long at all to adjust to kissing a muzzle instead of a humanoid mouth...

...and Primus, what's a guy to do but kiss her back?

The kiss took a small eternity to break, but Harrier wasn't complaining. He cradled her in his arms, feeling the small but strong frame against his, rubbing his hands over shoulder blades that were warm and wiry at once, appreciating the whisper of her feathers on his skin as she folded her wings around his back. ~Tempest, my Tempest, you've made it...~

...and that was the most important thing.

When they finally parted, she looked up at him. The shyness and trepidation on her face was a strange emotion, though no stranger than the unbridled passion of a moment before. Harrier could feel her quivering in his arms.

"Tempest, what's wrong?"

"I..." She bit her lip, hard enough for her teeth to draw blood. He could see the redness welling and it hurt him, hurt him probably more than it hurt her.

"Tempest, Samiel, please...you can trust me..." He moved his right hand so he could lay it on her shoulder. "Please. Before I can help you, I need to know what's wrong."

"I missed you," she whispered.

I hugged her close again; she clutched at me, as if he were going to disappear before her eyes unless she held me in this reality. Harrier shivered a little, thinking of the endless void of the Other Side -- a place he never wanted to return to again.

"You brought me back," he told her. "You saved me, from that Vehicon shell."

"Vehicon?" she whispered.

He gestured to the corner where he'd laid his weapons...a pair of long silver blades, swords which somehow reminded her of...

She ripped herself away from him, staring down at the bed. She was taken aback but tried not to show it. The pain on her face was plain to him, and Harrier had learned long ago that the truth of Tempest's heart was often buried deep beneath the surface, so deep that her actions served to camouflage it rather than reveal it. He waited, saying nothing, resting his hand on her thigh as a gesture of support.

"I didn't know," she said, almost sullenly. "I had no clue that you were Project Lancer. I would've killed you..."

"You couldn't have known," he replied. "But knowing or not, you did save me...you knocked me into the Oracle...and you cannot dispute that."

She nodded slowly.

"If I may," he added, "if you didn't know, why did you do it? To save the Maximals?"

A shrug. "Maybe. Spite, more like it. To spite the Vehicons, Megatron, Artemis for thinking I cared about nothing but myself. And to spite fate. To damn the destiny I've lived my life for...survival of the fittest. I've kept myself alive, alive in hell. Damn that. Right now I'd rather be dead."

He cringed and whined, unable to help it.

She turned her head, shot him a glare. Harrier winced as if physically struck. "Please don't," he whispered, feeling like she'd put one of her blades through his heart.

Samiel hung her head, collapsed onto the bed. "I'm tired," she whispered. "So tired. Please, Harrier, let me go...let it end."

"No. Stay with me." His hand tightened on hers as he lay down beside her, wrapping his arm around her side, urging her to roll over and face him. She did, staring at his face, so close to her own. "Please, Sammi. Stay with me."

She snorted noncommittally, but snuggled closer.

He swallowed hard, his brow furrowed in concentration. His mind was a roil. ~I can't say...but...~ He'd held the secret throughout the Beast Wars, so frightened that she'd turn away from him as she had once before. If Samiel feared anything, it was getting too close to someone, and if he opened his mouth he could lose her forever.

But now...after he'd been imprisoned in the Vehicon shell, and with Samiel about to give up on life, that look of pain on her face that twisted his own spark in sympathy...

...he had only one card to play.

Now or never.

After a few moments, he spoke. "Tempest, I've got something to tell you."

"Mmm?"

"I...I don't know how to say this, so I'm just going to spit it out. Please don't hate me."

Harrier suddenly had her full attention. She pushed herself up on one elbow, looking at him, her crippled leg stretched out on the bed and her good leg tucked up under her. Sighing, Harrier transformed and rose to a sitting position, swinging his legs over the side of the bed.

"I learned something, when I was a Vehicon," he murmured, staring down at his hands, not even raising his head as Samiel shifted her weight until she was sitting beside him. "Part of me seems to recall being trapped in that shell, a spectator to events, while I used those phase-shifters to cloak and attack the Maximals from hiding. I felt helpless, caught up in a life I couldn't control.

"And then I realized that in a way, I've always been caught up in a life beyond my control. As a child, I was a servant in Gnarth's bar until you found me--" he nodded to her "--and took me out of there. Then I was your second-in-command, through the long days of Phoenix Corps, until the Quintesson Occupation brought Decepticons and Autobots together. Still, it was much the same for me, always covering your back...until that incident on Tartarus."

Samiel hung her head. Harrier reached out and took her hand. "I don't blame you," he whispered. "I know why you pulled away from me. Because you were scared. Scared to care that much about anyone else. And guilty, for breaking your own credo of survival of the fittest for sparing me thanks to reasons that had nothing to do with your head and everything to do with emotions, emotions that had been almost burned out of you until you didn't know how to deal with them when you had them."

She blinked, surprised, and grew solemn, thinking about this. He had explained something she'd never understood in all the years since the incident he was describing; as if he knew her better than she knew herself.

"And so, we grew apart. After the war was won, I tried to get what I'd always wanted a mate, a manor, a life of luxury..."

She interrupted. "And then I started the Decepticon Rebellion, shattered the peace, brought down the Decepticons as well as the Autobots, gave rise to the Great Reformatting, and...killed you."

He blinked. "Killed me?"

"With a missile. Don't you remember? You were standing there beside Artemis Prime and I cooked off a missile...why in Primus' name were you there...Harrier..."

He wrapped his arms around her and sighed.

"I had an oath...an oath to Artemis Prime to help uphold the peace..." He swallowed hard. "But I never betrayed you, Tempest."

She looked up at him.

"I couldn't tell Artemis," he continued. "Primus help me, but I couldn't tell her what you were planning to do. I tried...but I couldn't."

"And you died anyway."

He sighed. This was something he'd never understood--how his life as a Decepticon had ended, how he'd woken up a century later in a Maximal body.

Right now, though, that was irrelevant.

"What does that matter now?" he whispered. "I'm here. You're here. We can do whatever we please."

She sighed, shook her head. "I was leader of the Decepticons, and led them to ruin. I was leader of the Predacons too, so briefly, and found myself lost on this barren Cybertron. Before I knocked you into the Oracle, I was a scavenger, living off the fuel in the drones I killed...it was Tartarus all over again. Cycles, Harrier, a prison of cycles."

"We aren't prisoners of destiny, Tempest. We aren't condemned to act out the same story again and again."

"Says you."

"No. Says the yellow Seeker who walked into a seedy, rundown bar one night and changed a servant boy's life." He leaned in so close that his nose was almost touching hers; she looked up along the length of his muzzle into his eyes. "You were always the one with the strength. Always the one with the faith. You were the one who was so determined that you could be more than what the universe had handed to you." His gaze flickered away. "I may not be able to agree with some of the things you did in your quest to excel, but I cannot begin to fault your hope."

"No hope now," she muttered. "I'm crippled. One of the weak. I will die."

"Only if you insist on doing everything alone!"

"That is what life IS!" she shot back. "In the end there is NO ONE to watch your back!"

"I will," Harrier said softly. "If you'll let me."

She stared at him, then shook her head. "No, Harrier. No. You..." a weak grin "...you deserve something more than me. What about your dreams? Your mate, your family, your manor house? That's what you need. Not following around an old soldier who's past her prime."

"I don't think I'm ever going to have that dream," the wolfhound told her.

"What? Oh, come on...if you help the Maximals liberate Cybertron, you'll be a hero and the girls will be all over you. I'm sure the conquering hero will be able to get himself a nice place and a pension from the Cybertronian council, and you can live in the lap of luxury for the rest of your life..." She broke off, noticing that Harrier had stopped listening. "What is it?"

He shook his head, staring down at his hands in his lap. "I don't want all those girls."

Samiel forced a smile, though inside, a stab of worry was pricking her. This serious melancholy was not like Harrier at all. Had his time as Lancer changed him that much? "Harrier, what's wrong?"

"I can't," he whispered. "I'm in love."

The yellow archaeopteryx blinked. Harrier had been in love before, supposedly, with an Autobot girl whose name Samiel couldn't recall; nevertheless, something in Samiel's mind had trouble accepting the idea of Harrier, the incessant flirt and playboy, in love. And love was not a word Harrier used lightly.

Something else felt oddly betrayed. She argued with herself... ~you told him to go find a better life, why be surprised when he does it?~ ...but that didn't stop this pain she didn't understand.

She forced a smile to her lips. "So why don't you tell her, already? Has Megatron got her spark?"

"No."

"So tell her! Primus, Harrier, you're the expert on this, not me."

"What if she says no?"

"What if any of them said no? Who rated a page in the Cybertronian military manual warning all the new girls about him? Harrier, come on!" She felt oddly uncomfortable. Love was not a topic she understood and Harrier was not acting himself at all...

"It never mattered this much before."

"Well, if it's any comfort, I say she's an idiot if she turns you down..."

Harrier's head jerked upwards, his eyes brimming with tears, his mouth twisted in pain. "Primus, Tempest, don't you understand?!"

She could feel his hurt, but had no idea of how to go about soothing it. The whole conversation was taking on an unreal quality. "Understand what?"

"You," he said, suddenly seizing her hand, leaning forward and looking directly into her eyes. "I'm in love with you."

Blink.

Samiel's mind was absolutely blank. "What?" she mouthed stupidly.

"Tempest, I'm in love with you. I have been ever since you walked through the doors of the Last Best Place. All these years..."

"But...but...that makes no sense...your girlfriends!"

"You were the one who kept urging me to go out, and so I did, never understanding what I was looking for, always wondering why none of those girls was enough to keep me happy. No wonder! All that time I was looking for you!" He blinked, shyly. "I just didn't know it."

Samiel, meanwhile, felt like she'd been hit in the head with a brick. She leaned up against him, half stunned by his proclamation, half weak from the aftermath of her injuries.

"Don't hate me," he whispered.

"No...Harrier, I don't hate you." Her thoughts twisted and churned. ~All this time you urged him away--and why did you care so much about his happiness, why were you willing to be alone so he could be happy, when were you ever the humanitarian? When were you ever willing to sacrifice?--when all along, he wanted...only wanted a mean and ugly Seeker like you?~

He nodded slowly, now looking rather frightened. "I felt...I had to tell you," he said, his voice raw with emotion, his hand gripping hers.

She rolled on her side, cuddling up against him, her mind in a roil. This made no sense, no sense at all... A dream, brought on by her injuries? Her mind was still cloudy. She was absolutely incredulous at the idea of Harrier in love with the likes of her...

"So what does this mean?" she asked slowly.

"What does what mean?" Harrier asked hesitantly.

"That you're...what you said."

"That's up to you." He reached out to her, but his hand stopped short in midair as if he were afraid to touch her. She reached up and drew his hand down, not to her body but to her lower arm, where he rested it. He was lying beside her now, his eyes gazing into hers. "I realize you might not feel the same..." he sighed "...realize you may not even be..." and his voice broke "...capable of that emotion, but...Tempest, Sammi, I can't hide it any longer."

"So when did you come to this realization?"

"When I found you on Earth, when I was a Maximal," he replied, sounding miserable. "It ripped me apart all through the Beast Wars."

And now she had her explanation for Harrier's behaviour...but still she didn't understand. "I...I'm still not sure what this all means, how our...relationship...is going to change."

"Well..." He swallowed, hard. "...if you tell me to, I'll simply bury this and we can go on the way we always did...just please don't hate me...I had to tell you..."

"And..." She was starting to feel somewhat frightened herself, trying to make sense of the emotions inside her. "And if I don't want you to bury it?"

He blinked at her, his expression softening, his lower jaw trembling with nervousness. "Well, then, I suppose we end up...dating, I guess that's what they call it."

"Okay...what's the difference between that, and the usual?" Samiel realized that romantic relationships had something to do with interfacing, but the lack of official relationship had hardly stopped her and Harrier from doing it before.

"Well...the most important thing is that we watch out for each other. That we can trust each other. That we're completely honest with each other." He looked deep into her eyes. "That we don't have to worry about getting hurt or used or manipulated by the other. That we are safe together."

She gave him a wan smile. "I don't have a good record for trustworthiness."

"You never betrayed me," he whispered.

"I killed you."

"I saw the shock on your face. You didn't think about that, did you? You didn't know it was me when you pulled the trigger."

"No. No, I didn't." She hung her head. "But I still can't believe I did it..."

"It's over," he said gently. "We learn, and then we go on."

She clung to him by way of response.

"And, I'm willing to make you a promise. Most couples...when they're together...swear that they're not going to become...romantically involved, shall we say, with anyone else."

She blinked at him.

"I won't make that demand of you, Tempest..."

"Sammi," she corrected, and her next words were almost tentative. "I like it...when you call me Sammi."

"Sammi," he murmured, stroking the little wisps of hair that curled at the nape of her neck, out from under her helmet. "I will promise to you..." he took her hands "that there will never be any other girls for me."

"But, Harrier!"

"I don't want any other girls," he insisted. "All I want is you. I want you to be able to trust me, and give that as a mark of my pledge."

She sniffed, struggled to contain the emotion. "I...Harrier, I don't know what in the Pit to make of all this!" Confusion swirled through her, looking for something to hold on to. She found an old memory, an old pain, and latched onto it. It hurt her, but it was also a comfort in a way...she understood anger so much more than affection. "I don't want a mate, Harrier. I don't want a consort."

Long ago, the pirate Backfire had called her his consort...dominated her, hurt her, abused her...and she'd put up with it until the time was right, when she'd killed him for his treasure...but it had left her with a stark fear of the word "mate."

"I understand," Harrier murmured, guessing what she was thinking of. "You know Backfire wasn't what a mate is supposed to be..."

"I don't care. I don't like the word. I don't belong to anyone. I am my own master..."

"I'm not asking you to," the dog-bot whispered. "All I ask is that you accept my help...and maybe, even, my love."

She could barely make sense of the affection he was showering on her. It confused her, frightened her...but her spark...there was an incredible warmth in her spark, and it was growing.

"It'd hurt you, if I found other lovers, wouldn't it?" she asked.

He looked away, but true to his word of honesty, he nodded slowly. "I wouldn't try to stop you," he said softly, trying to master his pain. "As you said, you are free..."

"It'll hurt you, though?" she insisted, trying to comprehend.

Another nod.

"Then I won't," she said, leaning forward and kissing his cheek. He looked up at her, somewhat startled. She responded with a simple, quiet answer. "I think we've both hurt enough."

Gently, he took her in his arms, holding him next to her. His grip was loose, and she didn't feel the least bit forced or restrained. She settled next to him, enjoying his warmth, listening to the rhythmic thud of his fuel pump, or whatever these techno-organic bodies had to move the life fluids around inside them.

They lay there like that for a long time, neither one saying anything. Finally, Harrier tilted his head, looking down at Samiel, admiring the curve of her helmet, the spray of blue hair, the bold feathers...

She shifted, moving her head until she was gazing right into his eyes. "I think I'd like that," she whispered.

"Like...?"

"Being your girlfriend." She smiled, then curled back up against him, resting her head on his chest.

His jaw dropped, his heart pounded, his head was swallowed up by an incredible dizzying rush... He guessed he must have a ridiculous expression on his face, because Samiel was peeking back up at him, giggling.

"Primus, you're beautiful when you smile."

She sobered up, as if trying to decide whether he was mocking her or not. He gently took her hand in his...

...and again, a winning smile, betraying the warmth under the warrior's armour.

***

"Hey, Pantera!"

The jaguar's head rose as she looked for the source of the voice. It ended up coming from the grate at her feet, as Rattrap pushed the lid up and climbed out of the hole. "I been lookin' for ya, 'Tera. Lancer wants to talk to you."

"Where is he?"

"Back at base."

Pantera growled softly. She'd been deliberately avoiding the Maximal base for the last week because she knew that was where Samiel was recovering from her injuries. She'd hated the archaeopteryx long before the yellow bitch had deliberately led those Vehicons into the base...

...and, Pantera admitted, suffered great damage knocking Project Lancer into the Oracle.

~Wait a minute...~ "Rattrap, you called him Lancer. That was what Megatron named his Vehicon shell. What's his real name?"

Rattrap shrugged. "You got me. He doesn't talk much."

"Primal couldn't get anything out of him?"

"Nada, zip, zilch. We're wondering if what Megatron did to him scrambled his memory circuits or something."

"Silverbolt was fine."

"Silverbolt wasn't equipped with inter-dimensional phase shifters. Ironhorse said the shifters shouldn't have affected Lancer's head, but I dunno. The horse's mind is pretty warped, if you ask me. How would he know how an ordinary mortal would be affected?"

"So what exactly has Lancer doing?"

"Looking after Samiel."

Pantera's eyebrows raised.

"Yeah, that's what I thought too. I can't believe it. We can hardly pry Lancer away from her side."

"That's exactly what we need," Pantera hissed. "As soon as Samiel wakes up, she'll start rebuilding her army...and Lancer's probably the first sucker she'll set her sights on."

Now she had to go to the Maximal base...for Lancer's sake.

***

"Lancer?" Pantera called into the darkened corridor.

She heard a few footfalls in the corridor, saw the looming bulk, and then, Lancer came forward into the light. Pantera hadn't seen him since he'd leapt out of the Oracle in his new Maximal form, and even then, he'd transformed in a flash... ~just as Strika came closing in on Samiel,~ Pantera remembered. This was the first time the jaguar was able to get a good look at Lancer's beast mode...and what she saw was impressive.

Lancer was a wolfhound, a large and muscular canine even bigger than the Fuzor Silverbolt had been. Saw-edged armour decorated his shoulder guards; his long tail was ridged with blades. His forepaws sported a long metal claw in addition to his beast claws; his hind legs had tubes on their back where his long swords rested while he was in beast mode. He had a spot over his right eye, and his cheeks were scored with air vents. A chestnut forelock curled between tall vertical ears. His chest was stainless steel, surrounded by chain mail...

...the whole array was vaguely familiar to Pantera, particularly the round metal ornamentation over his rib cage, but she couldn't quite place it.

"You asked to talk to me?" Pantera asked him.

Lancer nodded, once, and led her out of the base. Just as Rattrap had said, the wolfhound was quiet and subdued, though there was nothing to suggest shyness or fear. He seemed lost in his own thoughts.

"Have you regained your memory?" Pantera said, by way of breaking the ice.

He sat himself down on an outcropping overlooking an underground lake, turned towards her, and pricked his ears, but he did not speak.

"Your former existence," the jaguar prompted as she curled up a short distance away. "Do you remember who you were before you became a Vehicon?"

A short, brief nod.

"What's your name, then?"

Silence.

"Lancer is what Megatron called you. What's your real name? Do you remember?"

"It doesn't matter," he said softly.

Pantera frowned.

"I brought you out here to ask you a favour. It's regarding Samiel."

At the mention of the name, all the fur on the jaguar's back bristled. "I owe her no favours, and neither do you. This might not be easy for you to hear, but you need to know. Rattrap and Braddore told me how enamored you are with her. She's not what you think. She's a former war criminal, a..."

"I know."

Pantera blinked. "You knew her...before?"

"Better than you did," he retorted, almost angrily, and then he bowed his head. "Better than she knew herself."

"I know enough," the jaguar snapped. "She betrayed me, started a rebellion, destroyed the peace I'd worked so hard to build..."

"That peace frightened her. Don't you understand? Look at the law she lived her life by. Survival of the fittest. Without the constant conflict to keep Cybertron viable, she was afraid we'd grow weak and fall prey to outsiders--Quintessons, Rokkans, who knows. In her own way she was doing what she thought was right."

"Look at all the death and destruction she wrought! How can you possibly justify..."

"I'm not saying she was right. I'm saying she did what she thought she had to do, based on the experiences she'd had...the hells she'd been through."

"Poor Tempest," Pantera sneered. "So her homeworld was destroyed. So what. Stormrave came from the same place, and she's not a psychopath."

"Stormrave fled. Tempest was left behind, at the mercy of the pirates. When they were done with her, they dropped her off on Tartarus to die."

Tartarus. Pantera remembered how a crew of Cybertronians had crashed there during the Quintesson Occupation. Only a handful had survived the crash and the subsequent attacks by the cannibalistic Scavengers who lived there...Cavalier, Harrier, Springer...and Tempest. Tempest had been different when she'd returned...

"Don't you understand? All her life Tempest knew no other way!"

"So what? The damage has been done. Are you suggesting she doesn't have to pay for her crimes?"

"She's paid." He bowed his head. "She's paid in full. Look around you, Pantera. It's a new world, a new way of life. There's so few of us left."

"That's what Primal tried to tell her. She didn't listen."

"She needs time to learn...you can't just give up on her."

"She doesn't want our help!"

"She'll take mine." Lancer set his jaw firmly. "I'm not asking you to go out of your way to help her. All I ask is that you don't provoke her. Don't respond to her jibes. She needs to be safe somewhere."

"And what guarantee do I have that she won't attack us?"

"She has no need to. Her primary target is the Vehicons...and if that's not enough for you, then will you take my word?" His eyes bored into hers. "If she does anything to harm you, you can take it out on me. I swear it."

Pantera was taken somewhat aback. "Lancer, you don't know what you're saying. You hardly know her. Tempest has a reputation for coldblooded treachery..."

He tilted his head with a faint smile on his lips. "And Starscream doesn't?"

Her jaw dropped. "What...how did you know about Starscream?"

"Oh, I heard rumours, around the Maximal base...and I remember the Occupation. That wasn't Thundercracker in that old shell..."

She growled, but inside she was smiling. The wolfhound was clever, she'd give him that. "Very well. You accept Starscream's presence, and I'll accept Samiel's...but she'd better not cross me or else..."

He looked saddened for a moment. "Pantera, what did the Oracle tell you?"

"The shades of grey must be sought...to release the warrior within, you must tame the beast without..."

"What else?"

"The seeds of the future lie buried in the past."

"That's right. Buried in the past. But the most important part of that sentence is, the seeds of the FUTURE. Right now...and I hate to say it, Pantera...but you're still living in the past. That past is over and gone now. We must make amends and lay old enmities to rest, if we're ever going to go on from here."

Pantera's eyes widened. "That's why you're quiet, isn't it? It's not that you don't remember who you are...it's that you don't care to remember!"

He bowed his head. "I made so many mistakes," he whispered. "Both Sammi and I made so many mistakes...blundering around in the dark, trying to figure out what in the Pit we were doing...under siege from so many sides." The jaw set firmly as a tear ran from the spot-circled eye. "It's got to end somewhere, Pantera. We need to learn to forgive, to stand firmly for a belief...to take responsibility rather than running away or lashing out. ALL of us."

"I think we can do it together," Pantera said quietly.

He nodded in agreement. "I need to get back to base. Samiel should be waking up soon. You don't need to come back with me."

"I think I will, at least part of the way." They walked along in silence for a few moments before Pantera spoke again. "I still hope you know what you're getting yourself into. Samiel has never been an easy individual to handle."

"I love her anyway," he murmured.

"That's a...sudden declaration, for a newly awakened Maximal."

"We've known each other a lot longer than that."

"You knew her...before, then?"

"She saved my life. Many, many times."

Pantera had never imagined Tempest as a self-sacrificing hero, not even in the days when Tempest had been her second-in-command. "That's a side of her..."

"...you've never seen. I know. There's very few people she trusts that much."

The jaguar grinned. "So what makes you so special?"

"I'm the Duke of Decepticons," he grinned, and in that moment, Pantera got a good look at the patch on his shoulder--a purplish spot that, if glimpsed at the right angle, bore an odd resemblance to the Decepticon shield.

"Harrier?" Pantera gasped.

A flash of that old, charming smile...

...and then the quiet was broken by a loud avian scream from above. Pantera looked up to see the familiar colours of a red, white and blue gyrfalcon diving down on them. It was obvious that his chosen landing ground was the wolfhound's back...

...but his plans were foiled when the dog-bot unfolded two VTOL engines from his sides and rose up five feet in the air, overtop of Starscream's projected landing run. The falcon was traveling too fast to redirect; flapping his wings, he made a rather undignified landing on the ground and stalked over to Pantera.

"I hear the yellow bitch was raising trouble," he said by way of greeting.

"Nice to see you too, Screamer," Pantera replied.

"Yeah, yeah. Who's Hover Boy?" He gestured to the wolfhound, touching down behind him now and shutting off his VTOLs.

"Starscream, meet Duke Harrier of the Decepticon Empire."

Starscream peered up at the wolfhound. "Duke of the Decepticon Empire?" he sneered. "There's no such thing as Decepticon nobility...AAWK!" he shrilled, as Harrier transformed and took a swipe at him. Starscream transformed as well, glaring at the wolfhound, who was a good head taller than him. Harrier leaned over, pressing the tip of his canine muzzle to Starscream's nose, snarling with his lips curled up to reveal long white fangs.

"And don't call Samiel a bitch," Harrier said in a low voice.

"No fair, just because you're taller than me!" the bird-bot growled, backing off.

Pantera had a paw over her mouth to stifle her laughter. Her eyes twinkled as she looked over at Harrier. During the Beast Wars, Harrier had been almost laughable, a cute little foxhound with an impulsive nature to shoot off his mouth and bite off more than he could chew. In the time since, Harrier had matured into a formidable-looking warrior with a quiet dignity. Pantera also suspected that, while foxhound Harrier had followed Samiel everywhere, wolfhound Harrier was the kind to stand up for his principles. And, she remembered, as long as she'd known him, Harrier had been a robot of honour with a good heart.

Perhaps she could even put up with Samiel...for Harrier's sake.

***

"You think you're up to it?" Harrier asked her gently.

"If I have to spend one more cycle in this recovery room, I'm going to go out of my skull," Samiel growled, swinging herself to a sitting position on the bed.

"I was talking to Braddore. He thinks he can rig up some kind of brace that'll compensate for the worst of the damage on your leg."

She retorted automatically, "I don't need a..." And then she paused, considering. When she spoke again, her tone was level. "Tell him I'd appreciate that."

"Well then, shall we see what's going on in the Maximal base?"

"All right." Leaning on Harrier's shoulder, she slowly got to her feet. She took a tentative step, gasping as her right leg buckled under her, but she didn't fall far before Harrier's arm tightened around her waist, holding her until she could get her feet back under her. Spreading her wings for balance, she and Harrier made their way down the corridor.

"I'm not particularly fond of being seen like this," she growled.

By way of reply, Harrier hooked one arm behind her knees, the other behind her wings, and scooped her up into his arms.

"Harrier! Put me down!"

"Do you really want me to?" And his teasing face became serious.

Her brow furrowed.

Ah, what the hell.

"No."

"Fine then." Harrier laughed, swinging her in his arms. "The seeds of the future," he murmured under his breath.

"What?" Samiel demanded.

"The seeds of the future," he repeated, almost shyly.

"Oh, please. Have you actually been listening to Primal's metaphysical drivel?"

A shrug. "I found something special in my past...and I'd like to see a lot more of her in my future."

Samiel blinked, and for once, had nothing to say.

THE END


End file.
